For Blake Lively, the perfect Valentine’s Day begins and ends with the same activity, eating chocolate. The “Gossip Girl” actress turned up at the Andaz Hotel in Manhattan Wednesday to promote the holiday partnership between Godiva and Nicholas Sparks, who was also present and promoting his most recent book-cum-film, “The Lucky One.”

Lively, a self-proclaimed chocolate lover (like her mother, who was seen stuffing herself full of chocolates at the event) was on hand in a Valentino ensemble, eager to chat about the many ways she incorporates the ingredient into her diet (mostly in desserts, sometimes for breakfast). Lively stationed herself teetering in her Louboutin’s in front of a desk decorated with the chocolate-maker’s famous truffles, talking and laughing with Sparks. She spoke briefly about her coming role in “Savages,” where she stars as the kidnapped girlfriend of two marijuana growers, a stark departure from her role as Upper East Side socialite in “Gossip Girl.”

“My character has a lot to go through, being ripped from her home at night by a drug cartel, it’s not a normal experience,” said Lively. The film is directed by Oliver Stone and also stars Academy Award nominated Demian Bichir, John Travolta and Taylor Kitsch. Lively is headed to Bali next week to continue shooting.

Although the actress consumed much of the spotlight, Sparks also spoke about his coming film, “The Lucky One” which stars Zac Efron and Taylor Schilling and marks the author’s eighth novel adapted to film. “It’s quite difficult to create a novel that’s original, interesting and universal. If you take original and interesting, you get Hannibal Lecter, but not everyone has a cannibalistic friend,” said Sparks, referring to the third element of his trifecta, universal.

Godiva approached Sparks to participate in their “Sweetest Story Ever Told” sweepstakes. The winner will have their name inscribed in one of Sparks’ upcoming unwritten novels. According to the author, it takes him four months to conceive a story and then writes 2,000 words a day for four to seven months. He knows he’ll only use 90,000 of those 140,000 words, but he says the extra words are necessary for the story arc. “There’s only three endings you can have. I want mine to always be unpredictable, and they always are,” said Sparks, adding, “it’s a formula that works.”

Alexandra Cheney is a culture reporter for The Wall Street Journal. Follow her on Twitter @alexandracheney.